set the loadstone; it had caused a soul to fly with swift wings towards

the deserted one; it had sent the dove to console the creature whom the

thunderbolt had overwhelmed, and had made beauty adore deformity. For

this to be possible it was necessary that beauty should not see the

disfigurement. For this good fortune, misfortune was required.

Providence had made Dea blind.

Gwynplaine vaguely felt himself the object of a redemption. Why had he

been persecuted? He knew not. Why redeemed? He knew not. All he knew was

that a halo had encircled his brand. When Gwynplaine had been old enough

to understand, Ursus had read and explained to him the text of Doctor

Conquest de Denasatis, and in another folio, Hugo Plagon, the passage,

Naves habensmutilas; but Ursus had prudently abstained from

"hypotheses," and had been reserved in his opinion of what it might

mean. Suppositions were possible. The probability of violence inflicted

on Gwynplaine when an infant was hinted at, but for Gwynplaine the

result was the only evidence. His destiny was to live under a stigma.

Why this stigma? There was no answer.

Silence and solitude were around Gwynplaine. All was uncertain in the

conjectures which could be fitted to the tragical reality; excepting the

terrible fact, nothing was certain. In his discouragement Dea intervened

a sort of celestial interposition between him and despair. He perceived,

melted and inspirited by the sweetness of the beautiful girl who turned

to him, that, horrible as he was, a beautified wonder affected his

monstrous visage. Having been fashioned to create dread, he was the

object of a miraculous exception, that it was admired and adored in the

415

The Man Who Laughs